By the time the 1850 U.S. Census was taken, the United States was no longer a slow-growing collection of coastal settlements. It was a booming, restless, coast-to-coast land of contradictions. The population had reached over 23 million people. The western frontier had stretched all the way to California. Cities were growing fast, but most people still lived on farms. The railroad and steamboat had made the country feel smaller, even as it grew larger. And in the background, tension over slavery and statehood was rising like a tide that couldn't be turned back.

Amid all this change, the federal government made one small but radical adjustment to the census: it began listing the names of every free person in the household. For family historians, it's the moment where the lights come on.

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